Attorney general tackles scrap-metal thefts from homes in Brockton visit

Attorney General Martha Coakley used an abandoned Brockton home, stripped of its water main, gas line and other copper plumbing, to illustrate the need for statewide regulation of scrap metals sales. Officials say 90 percent of homes in Brockton that are abandoned for six to 12 months have the copper plumbing stolen from them.

The legislation he and Coakley are pushing would create a Secondary Metals Computer Registry, which would provide law enforcement officials with records of what scrap metal was being sold in the state and who was on each side of the transaction.

It would also create a state Abandoned Property Registry, a two-year pilot program to catalog all the foreclosed, abandoned and vacant properties in Massachusetts.

Concerns at the local level are that abandoned properties drive down surrounding home values and cause neighborhood blight.

Fixing them up after a period of vacancy is hard enough, but the cost can be prohibitive if it has been vandalized.

“It makes people think twice about whether they want to do it or not,” said Mayor Linda Balzotti, who also went on the tour.

“This is one little piece of what we need (to do) to get out of this recession,” Coakley said.